Saturday, December 15, 2007

Rebecca Rosenblum & the Journey Prize Anthology

Scanning the online version of the Globe this morning, I found a review of the current Journey Prize Anthology. Biblioasis has three authors in the current collection: Patricia Robertson, for a story from her current The Goldfish Dancer; a story by Grant Buday, shortlisted for the Metcalf-Rooke Award for his fine novel Dragonflies (and recently signed onto the good ship Biblioasis), and Metcalf-Rooke Award winner Rebecca Rosenblum.

Rebecca's story comes in for some praiseworthy treatment from the Globe's reviewer. See below. Congrats, Rebecca.

It's unclear whether the main character of Rebecca Rosenblum's postmodern Cinderella aspires to escape her chilly existence, but until a party in an air-conditioned condo, Emmy holds herself so far apart from others that she is physically as well as figuratively cold. Rosenblum employs the language and rhythm of fairy tales to lend the Chilly Girl its gravity, and the choice is apt; the exchange of innocence for experience is one of the oldest stories. But unlike the other stories in this collection, Emmy's gain isn't wisdom tinged with loss, but wisdom rife with possibility. This is only one of the ways that Rosenblum subverts expectation in this diamond-sharp story. Besides making the cut for the anthology, Chilly Girl is also her first published story. Wow!